Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha

Cover art by Grapefruitwannabe

What had started out as a cheerful enough day had really taken a nose dive after lunch, Kagome reflected sullenly with a glance down at the leg she had hastily wrapped only minutes before. Blood was already faintly showing through the torn blue cloth that had once been part of her kimono. But there was nothing more she could do about it.

"Which way did she go?!" shouted a bandit from overhead.

The girl pushed herself more firmly against the cliff side niche she was hidden in, closing her eyes tight and praying with everything she had that the bandits wouldn't look over the side of the cliff that they stood on. If even one thought to it would all be over.

"Don't know but she couldn'ta gotten far, c'mon!" boomed another bandit.

"Spread out! Comb the area!"

She heard heavy footfalls all over the place from above and realized even if they were stupid enough to not check for her here she would still never be able to get back up on her own. She was effectively trapped.

Frantically Kagome looked for some way down. The cliff loomed over a giant forest. There would be nobody for miles around to help her but she guessed she should just count her blessings that she'd had the time and sense to wrap her leg while escaping the bandits in the woods on top of the cliff. If she hadn't, the blood would have led them right to her.

Then she saw it in the light of the sunset, a tiny path along the rock descending down the cliff.

Despite her run-in with the bandits, it seemed luck was favoring her again. If only for the moment. But if she stayed put, that moment would pass. There was a ridge right beneath her that connected to it, But it was a drop off to get there.

She didn't know what she should be more afraid of, trusting her bad leg to not buckle beneath her in the wrong way and send her off the cliff, or the drop making too much noise and alerting the bandits. Still, she couldn't wait here for them to leave and climb back up, and she wouldn't wait for them to find her. That little ridge was her only way out.

A crash of thunder in the distance made her look up in horror. 'As if things weren't bad enough?! It was already going to be dark soon and now it's going to rain too?'

Quickly tightening the little bundle on her back, Kagome steeled herself. She had to get a move on fast. Her tiny moment of luck was passing far sooner than she'd expected.

The girl sat down with her legs over the side of her ridge she'd been hiding on and turned herself around as she slowly edged off until she was just holding on with her hands dangling from the cliff reaching her toes to try to find the rock beneath her.

But she knew it would be no use. She'd have to drop.

"Ohhhh," she moaned more quietly than a whisper. "If I was just a little taller..."

At first, she hesitated. If she lost her balance from the drop and fell backward from this height it meant certain death. She gulped, her heart pounding in her chest with fear, and clung to the rock a little tighter looking up above where the bandits remained searching for her.

But at least if she fell to her death she would still escape the fate that waited for her up there.

Letting go of the breath she'd been holding her hands released the ledge and her feet rapidly hit the ground beneath her stumbling forward into the wall of the cliff. She quickly stifled her cry of pain with her hands and crumbled to her knees on the more generous rock surface. It took her a few moments to regain herself. Still wincing and reaching down to clutch her right leg to numb the pain. She listened above for a sign that they'd heard her. But if anything it sounded like the bandits were drawing away from the cliffside.

'Please, Just a little more good luck,' she thought hopefully, looking back at the ridge.

She took the opportunity to rest for a moment before making the descent and examined her wound again. The bloodstain was darker now.

Maybe she could find some herbs to treat it in the forest below if she got down quickly enough? The sun was still up after all.

But with a storm fast approaching and in unfamiliar territory that hope felt foolish.

She shakily got to her bare feet and started to creep down the ledge as quickly and carefully as she could with her trembling hands on the wall of the cliff guiding her. The wounded leg made the trip down slower than she would have liked but the ridge was wide enough for a girl her size to walk along easily enough otherwise.

She had nearly reached the bottom of the cliff when she heard a voice up above call out, "Look, she's down there!"

She glanced up horror-stricken and saw a bandit glaring down at her from the top of the cliff.

"Quick she's getting away!" he shouted back toward his comrades.

Without a second thought, Kagome scrambled the rest of the way down and jumped the five-foot distance to the ground below. The fall made her stagger and fall to her hands and knees roughly in the tall grass. But in half a second she took off into the trees as quickly as she could, the sounds of men shouting growing louder behind her.

(-)

Inuyasha had already settled into his secluded cave for the night when the rain started to pour and the lightning started to crash outside. He sat by the entrance of his hiding place patiently awaiting the new moon when he heard the sound of something clumsily running through the rain and falling right beneath his position. He glanced out warily through the brush of the tree that hid the cave entrance. And there in the darkness of the storm and the heavy rain, he saw a girl. She had collapsed to her hands and knees in the mud outside, panting for air as if she had run for miles.

He looked at the human intruder cautiously. 'Did she mean to find me here or was this a coincidence?' He wondered watching her struggle to breathe. 'Is she in some kind of trouble?'

He inhaled deeply.

The smell of blood and sweat reached him faintly through the rain. He inhaled again and this time, her sweet natural scent came to him along with the scent of tears.

He watched as she struggled to get to her feet shivering with the painful effort, or the cold of the rain, or both.

Stubbornly she got up and limped slowly with great effort towards the nearest tree and sat down under it properly huddling herself against the trunk and resting. She was absolutely drenched. Her hair and clothes were plastered to her body. She looked miserable.

Shakily she reached down to tend to a badly wrapped leg wound that was soaked with blood.

She loosened the wraps to glance at the wound with a wince. Hesitantly she pulled the bandage off and held it under the rain to wash the blood and dirt away. His senses must have indeed dulled to have only now noticed the smell of so much blood when it had been coming closer.

Now he was sure she was in trouble. But still, he hesitated. He could feel his senses fade even as he watched her.

Should he save her and risk revealing his night of weakness? Or let her die feet away from a dry cave when he could have helped her?

He watched her with agonizing attention. She washed the strip of cloth the best she could in the rain and with trembling fingers brought it back under the somewhat drier shade of the tree. Risk himself? Or let a helpless girl die right in front of him? She wrung out the dirty cloth and clumsily re-wrapped her wound.

Just as she had finished, he heard the sound of others coming closer. Heavy footsteps and men's voices.

Apparently, she heard them too. Her head jerked up and she looked around fearfully.

Inuyasha stared transfixed as she quickly fought to her feet only to stagger backward against the tree uttering out a soft cry of pain. She tried to stand again and once more she collapsed. This time to her hands and knees on the roots of the tree. She didn't get up a third time. There was a long pause as it finally seemed to soak in that she couldn't run any further and then she lowered her head and sobbed softly.

Inuyasha couldn't bring himself to just watch anymore.

Leaping down from his cave to a tree branch and then the ground, the icy cold of the rain did little to distract him from his current undertaking. He took a step toward the prone girl and then another.

'I can't just let her die.'

At his third step, the girl froze and slowly started to lift her head up.

Clear blue eyes met his gray with an open mixture of pleading, heartfelt sorrow, dread and a slew of other emotions he couldn't have possibly described. But she also stayed still.

He knelt down bracing his knee against one of the tree roots beside her. "I'm not going to hurt you," he murmured. The voices of the other men were coming closer. He had to do this quickly and quietly.

Her expression shifted to surprised then to hopeful.

"Y-You're not one of them?"

"No, And we don't have long. They're coming this way."

"I-I can't keep going," she told him miserably.

"You don't need to. If you trust me I can save you," he responded hurriedly.

She paused and really looked at him.

He heard a branch crack closer than before. She heard it too. Terror broke out over her face as she looked into the distance at her approaching hunter.

"Just trust me," he pled.

She looked back at him with determination. "Okay," she whispered.

He smiled at her encouragingly and reached forward, gently scooping an arm under her knees and around her back, tugging her against his chest. She curled herself towards his warmth shivering and he felt a tiny jolt of protectiveness hit him. He lifted her up with a little effort and quietly ran back to the tree. Inuyasha had to climb to get back into the cave, And it would be a challenge getting her up there in his human form but he was confident in his ability. He shifted the frozen and weak girl to his back and ordered her to hold on tight for as long as she could. She obliged meekly, locking her arms around his neck and burying her face in his hair in her retreat from the rain.

He had a little trouble getting up the tree with her clinging to him. But once he got high enough he easily slipped them both into the cave and dropped her off away from the entrance. He watched the clearing for activity from the safety of their hiding place.

The figures of two men indeed entered the clearing. Also doubtlessly soaked and tired. But they merely glanced around the clearing and moved on. The dark and the rain made it impossible for them to track her to the cave.

The lightning crashed not far away and the bandits jumped at the sound grumbling as they left. "Damned boss and his damn orders."

Inuyasha watched them go carefully. He would have to double check for them in the morning. But for the moment... He glanced back inside the cave at the soaked girl. She was huddled against a wall of the cave shivering. Well... For better or worse He was stuck with her now.

He approached slowly, as if afraid to startle her.

"T-Thank you," she stammered out between lightly chattering teeth as he got close.

"...You're welcome," he responded hesitantly. Would she have trusted him this far if she'd known he was a half-demon? Would she still thank him in the morning when she saw what he really was?

"W-What's your name?" she asked softly.

"...Inu... yasha," he replied even as he mentally grimaced.

She either didn't notice that his name meant dog demon or she just didn't care. Because she didn't comment on it either way.

"I-I'm K-Kagome," she stuttered back from her huddled position in the dark.

"Look... Kagome... I know you're cold but I can't start a fire..." He hesitated probably for a whole minute before he finished what he needed to say.

"But... I'll turn away and you can take off the wet clothes. I'll loan you some of mine."

"O-Okay," she responded weakly. He nodded and quickly walked back to his former spot by the entrance of the cave sporting a bright blush.

"Okay, you can strip," he told her, fighting down his embarrassment at the situation.

With an agonizingly slow pace, she peeled off her clothes and laid them out on a rock as he waited.

Inuyasha concentrated on the sounds of the storm and the humans yelling at each other and stumbling around the woods as they grew further and further away.

'Why are they chasing this girl through a thunderstorm at night?' he wondered with some confusion. 'Did she steal something?'

"Done," she murmured wearily.

Without looking back He silently took off his outer kisode then the inner one and threw the dry inner kisode back to her. "Sorry, it's not much."

Thankfully putting on the kisode took almost no time at all.

"Done," she repeated as she slid back to the ground. He glanced back at her in the dark of the cave. But with only his pitiful human vision he didn't really see much.

He could see her outline and the white of his kisode but mostly he just noticed How hard she was breathing. Even as a human, he could hear her heavy uneven breaths. He quietly watched the girl's form as she shakily gathered up her hair and started wringing it out.

Her wound she had tried to treat earlier came into focus somewhat. The dirty makeshift bandage was still in place. If it wasn't treated soon it would get infected. But he didn't have anything to treat it with here.

As she finished wringing out her hair she laid back against the rock wall exhausted.

"Alright, why were those men chasing you?" he asked gruffly.

"They were bandits I think," she explained weakly. "They caught me on the road."

"And they kept chasing you through here? In the middle of this?" he asked suspiciously.

"Down a cliff too," she added to his astonishment. "I've been trying to get away from them since midday."

"Did you steal something from them?"

"I stole nothing but myself," she snorted wearily.

With a sigh, he knelt down across from her and offered his outer haori as well. It was still a little damp but it was drying fast. "Here."

She reached out and took the cloth draping it over her shoulders like a blanket. "Thanks..." she murmured again.

"No problem," he responded before rising to his feet. "I've got a spot in the back where you can sleep. It's not much but it's warm."

She nodded and tried to get up to her feet but she trembled and looked like she would fall any moment.

"Here," he murmured, offering his arm.

She took it gratefully and leaned against his side as he led her to his pile of furs in the back.

"...So how did you hurt your leg?"

"The bandits did it right after they caught me so I wouldn't be able to run. But wounded or not I wasn't about to let them rape me. I ran anyway while they weren't looking."

"That takes a lot of guts."

She uttered a soft "Yeah I guess." And nodded in the dark. When they reached the back of the cave he led her gently to a haphazardly stacked pile of furs he mostly just kept for winter.

"Here, Go to sleep. I won't bother you or anything," he murmured.

"Okay... "she answered, then abruptly she turned to face him and gave a tired smile.

"Thank you again for saving me Inuyasha. I won't forget it."

He looked away as quickly as he could manage, fighting against a blush that was working hard to be seen even in the dark.

"Really, Don't worry about it," he managed.

She seemed to nod and then she released his arm and eased herself into the pile of furs. There, she made herself comfortable and quickly fell asleep.

He looked back at the entrance of the cave and sighed to himself, rubbing his upper arms to fight back the chill. Human nights were always rough, and he hadn't expected to sleep tonight anyway. But it was still wet, cold and miserable to have to wait through. At least he wouldn't have to worry about getting sick later.

Silently, Inuyasha pulled a spare pelt from the pileup and pulled it around his shoulders awkwardly.

He glanced at the girl sleeping not a foot away.

With his weak human vision, he couldn't even make out her shape while she laid under the furs. But earlier he had caught her scent and seen her to a degree.

He didn't know what to make of her. 'What does she mean she won't forget? Does she intend to repay me somehow?'

He snorted and turned back to the rain. Maybe she did intend to repay him now, but that tune was going to change once she realized what he really was.

He sighed wearily. She was probably going to scream or throw something at him or flinch away from him... And if she did he'd leave her the hell alone. He'd gone into this knowing there would be no reward and no genuine thanks once day broke. But if she didn't freak out... Well, she would probably need help a little longer, and he had already helped her this much. Might as well finish the job.

Again, he couldn't help but glance at the girl. This time a little longer than before. He might not have been able to see her but he could still feel her presence beside him like a torch in the night.

It was strange having a girl sleeping so close to him... And beyond strange was that she was sleeping next to him wearing only his clothes, on his bed of fur. The same fur he'd hunted for and dried. It brought a range of emotions he couldn't hope to indulge in.

Maybe if she didn't start screaming the moment she saw him the next day... Then maybe he would explore those emotions. But for now, he settled in for a long moonless night.

Authors note (edit 4/22/17)

nekochanlover69 asked why Inuyasha has gray eyes so I decided to leave the explanation I gave them here for anyone else who is confused.

He has gray eyes because he is human for most of the first chapter, and in most official depictions of his human form he is shown with gray eyes.

In the manga, the eye color seems to vary, however, Rumiko Takahashi is well known for experimenting with hair and eye colors with ALL her human Characters so technically his eyes could be a lot of different colors. But In the anime, he's consistently shown with what appears to be gray eyes so that's what I went with. Hope this answered your question!